Wars of attrition are won by whoever can keep paying for them, and Vladimir Putin has spent more than four and a half years betting that Ukraine’s Western partners would tire before Russia’s treasury did. In three days, Washington gave that bet its best return in months.
On October 9, President Donald Trump announced a deal for diesel fuel with the Kremlin. The next day, he suggested that Ukrainians find themselves a new president. On October 11, he proclaimed an “ENERGY CEASEFIRE” that Kyiv had not been told about and that Moscow declined to confirm; within hours, Russian strikes hit the CHP-5 power plant in Ukraine’s Kharkiv.
